


And so the caged bird sang

by StolenMidnightKisses



Category: Original Work
Genre: Anorexia, Anorexia Nervosa, I wrote this coming out of a really dark place okay, I'm just gonna keep on slapping on warnings, Recovery, This has the potential to be very triggering, so discretion advised, trigger warning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-25
Updated: 2019-05-25
Packaged: 2020-03-17 11:53:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,061
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18964699
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StolenMidnightKisses/pseuds/StolenMidnightKisses
Summary: I saw the secrets of the world in the hollows of my navel, in the lines of my ribs, in calories and numbers, in dizziness and an endless monochrome and numbness as anorexia whispered in my ear.But sometimes, in a fight between yourself and your mind, you can come out victorious.





	And so the caged bird sang

**Author's Note:**

> To anyone who reads this:  
> At the age of 14 I became anorexic. It wasn't due to magazines. I never had any interest in models. I wasn't overweight. It was just a little diet, that went very, very wrong.
> 
> I urge anyone who reads this and understands to go seek help if you haven't by now. I know it feels like you're doing the right thing, but you're not. Prove to the world how strong you are and fight against the ED. I implore you.
> 
> Without further ado, let's get into it.

Someone once asked me what a dislocated knee was like while I was waiting for the ambulance. I thought for a while and then replied that it felt like someone had placed a miniature star where my knee should have been, burning me from the inside out.

*

Someone once asked me what anorexia felt like whilst I was waiting for death. I thought long, but not necessarily hard because it was difficult to string together the vague tendrils of consciousness floating across my mind, and I didn't have the energy to chase their fleeting paths.

After I had done my thinking, I still didn't reply because how can you describe something that plagues you by day and seeps into your dreams by night? Something that infiltrates the deepest corners of your mind until you can't tell the difference between yourself and _it_? Or perhaps I didn't reply because the person asking was me. Asking why I was doing this to myself. Why I kept going, beside knowing that I should stop. Screaming to be let out of their cage. Screaming at me to live and not die. Screaming that I could fix everything and be myself again.

But screaming, I found, was awfully hard to hear when the sound of silence is louder. When anorexia locks that part of you deep inside a cage and smiles at the rest of you, fragmented and disjointed, reaching a hand out and telling you to come with them. That they'll set you free.

And why shouldn't you trust them, when they help the screaming stop?

*

Someone once asked me what anorexia was like while I waited for death.

I smiled at them, bitterly, a jaded little twist of a thing that spoke more than my words could.

I thought of chains and freedom and birds trapped in a cage wanting to sing. I thought purple nails and fainting and the world in front of you never in focus and you just want to grab the lens and twist it until you can see but you can't. Because you've forgotten how to lift your hands. How to have the energy to.

I thought of mirrors and crying and squats at 3am in the bathroom. I thought of legs giving out and sliding to the bottom of a shower shivering and cold. I thought of calories and food and measurements and grams.

I thought of the days blurring past me in monotonous shades of grey and black and calories calories calories.

I thought of the stuttering drum beat of my heart and missed periods.

But it was worth it because I was thin.

It was worth it because the scale was going lower and lower and it would never stop because I was in control.

I smiled but I didn't say a thing because I knew that no one could understand how wonderful this was but me.

And anorexia smiled back at me, reflected in the hollow of my navel, in the caressing of my ribs, and whispered promises of happiness. And how could I not want that?

And when the question was repeated again I smiled and said "good".

*

Someone once asked me what anorexia felt like whilst I was waiting for death.

I looked down and thought of my mother coming into my room to check if I was alive. I thought of her crying. Lying to my brother that she was okay. I thought of her desperately reading through pages and pages of words printed starkly in black and white about eating disorders in hopes that she would find something that would help me. A miracle cure.

I thought of me shouting at her that she was trying to make me unhappy. Shouting at her over 3 more grams of food than I'd wanted. Shouting at her because she didn't understand. I thought of her breaking down bit by bit. And I wondered if she could ever be built up again.

I thought of my dad saying that he didn't know who I was. Asking for his daughter back. Shouting at me in anger and in pain.

I thought of me hiding food in my socks. In my school bag. Hiding fruits my parents carefully prepared for me in clingfilm till they rotted and reeked like my breath. How my body would deteriorate if I continued. How it would be when I died. I thought of me not swallowing my last bite and then running to the bathroom and spitting it out. I thought of how much it hurt me. How much it hurt them.

I thought of my brother, unable to understand what was going on. I thought about how he'd started crying about the littlest of things. How he thought everything was his fault.

I thought of a broken home.

And I felt my eyes trying to water, but not being able to. I felt the bruises on my body. I felt how weak I was.

But I also felt how light I was. I felt my hips and my spine and my ribs protruding like a skeleton hidden by the cloth of flesh and it felt like progress.

I remembered how I could lay in bed and feel like I was finding the secret of life by starting at my thigh gap.

And I whispered " I don't know"

*

Someone once asked me what anorexia felt like, inbetween the quiet moments of the night.

I laughed, a bitter, fractured sound, and said "hell" as I looked up towards the stars.

I felt the fragility of my body and brittle bones and bruises but I also felt strength and happiness and _hope_.

I was trying and everything was going to be okay.

And there was anorexia in the corner of my mind, jaded and broken and what I was before I started trying and it asked me if this was what I really wanted- to be ugly and fat and worthless.

I smiled and thought of how small we are compared to everything. How insignificant we are in comparison to the stars.

I smiled and replied "I want to be free."

And when my parents gave me food for dinner, full of tredepation and weariness, tired of the screaming and crying and pain, I smiled at them and ate.

And so the caged bird was let out of its cage and sang.


End file.
